Occupy Wall Street Hosts First Gay Wedding

BY Julie Bolcer

November 21 2011 12:00 PM ET

Protesters returned to Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan Saturday for an afternoon of events that included the first same-sex wedding to take place at Occupy Wall Street.

The New York Daily Newsreports that activists Jonathan Lopez, 19, and Ivan Cabrera, 18, were married in “an unofficial ceremony" in the park that became synonymous with the global protests against economic inequality. Same-sex marriages have been available in New York since the marriage equality law took effect in July, but Gothamist reports that the wedding was the first such ceremony at the park.

As many as 200 protesters came to Zuccotti Park Saturday for the first time since police raided the area early last Tuesday morning, arrested about 140, and brought the two-month encampment to an end. Tents, tarps, and other sleeping gear are now banned from the location.

Cabrera, who had attended the protest since its start in September, told the Daily News, “They say we have freedom of speech, but we don’t. We’re nonviolent, and we got kicked out and hit. We’re trying to make this cause for the whole world.”